What information to measure? How to measure it?

Abstract

Purpose

Thinkers are still debating about the concept of information while engineers prepare astonishing digital appliances. The purpose of this paper is to address the following questions: what concepts do experts adopt in the working environment? What information do they measure? What can be done to help them?

Design/methodology/approach

This paper offers a concise report of the researches driven on the problem of the information definition. The report consists of three principal sections. The first section is twofold. On one hand, there are comments on the various information theories; on the other hand, the semiotics concepts (that engineers and professionals use in intuitive manner) are illustrated.

Findings

In consequence of the popularity of the semiotic notions – in the second section – the authors define the concept of signifier using the mathematical language, and discuss some features of this mathematical definition.

Practical implications

The third section closes the paper with the illustration of some advantages that the mathematical definition of the signifier offers on the practical plane and from the philosophical perspective.

Social implications

The ensemble of those advantages provides a bridge between the humanist culture and digital engineering.

Originality/value

The theoretical studies on the concept of information seem to be at a standstill. This paper shows how the measurement of the items of information is handy; and various equations can be unified into a comprehensive frame that facilitates the collaboration of experts coming from different areas.

Citation

Rocchi, P. (2016), "What information to measure? How to measure it?", Kybernetes, Vol. 45 No. 5, pp. 718-731. https://doi.org/10.1108/K-06-2015-0161